aMusic

Apple's New Attack On Amazon

Apple’s again looking to land itself on the butt end of an antitrust complaint after removing the iOS Amazon cloud music player, aMusic, from the App Store.

Citing legal reasons with the music industry, the author said he was confident that it could be returned. But we doubt it will be offered in its current incarnation. It will likely just play back a flashing letter “a,” since music executives and Apple are a cozy bunch. Ditto for the author’s other app gMusic, which works with Google’s music locker service, and will likely see the same fate of being tossed into a legal black hole in the next couple weeks.

Since Amazon and Google both pursued their music locker services without the approval of music studios and Apple’s iCloud music locker was arranged with their approval, Apple’s got a decent defense for this move.

But when added to the list of shady moves when handling media and music competitors like Spotify, this one’s starting to take on a Microsoft vs. Netscape feel.

The only reason Spotify likely made it into the iOS App Store was because the FCC intervened. Spotify also had the advantage that it had signed deals with the rights holders where Amazon and Google just steamrolled them entirely.

It will be interesting to see if the new leadership at Apple will be pursuing the same scorched earth methods favored by Steve Jobs, who no one denies was ruthless when dealing with competition.